


Five Nights

by Swordy



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Case Fic, Crossover, Five Nights at Freddy's 1, Gen, Horror, Hurt Dean Winchester, Hurt/Comfort, Post-Episode: s10e03 Soul Survivor, Season/Series 10
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-29
Updated: 2015-11-29
Packaged: 2018-05-04 01:18:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 14,372
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5314595
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Swordy/pseuds/Swordy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i> So they head for their mini vacation, because how better to avoid reality than pretend that they’re everyday people? Unsurprisingly, the charade lasts all of five minutes before Dean’s starting to hint at a possible case that he’s seen on the internet.</i>
</p><p>A pizzeria where the animatronic characters are far from cute and cuddly and no night watchman has lasted more than five nights on the job. Enter ex-demon, Mark of Cain possessor Dean Winchester and his slightly frayed younger brother, Sam, who’s got a busted arm and a gut feeling that they really don’t want to take this job. What could <i>possibly</i> go wrong?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you to thruterryseyes for the beta. This fic was Typo Central until she went to work on it. Fic written for the spn_joystick community at LJ because it was impossible to resist pairing the boys with Five Nights at Freddy’s. For anyone unfamiliar with the games, go watch them on YouTube, because they’re awesome. Thanks also to amberdreams, who agreed to pair up so that this amazing game had art with it. The art's in the fic, but go check out her masterpost [here](http://amberdreams.livejournal.com/366610.html) and leave her some love!

Beers by the lake are all well and good, but they both know reality’s going to intrude at some point. Sam’s still revelling in the novelty of having a brother who’s not a demon to really start worrying about the fact that Dean’s still got the Mark of Cain, and Dean’s just trying to wrap his head around being back.

So they head for their mini vacation, because how better to avoid reality than pretend that they’re everyday people? Unsurprisingly, the charade lasts all of five minutes before Dean’s starting to hint at a possible case that he’s seen on the internet.

Sam’s first instinct is _fuck no_. His shoulder is still pretty busted (so much so that he’s still wearing the sling, even though it means having to endure Dean’s constant mocking) and Dean... well, Dean has just survived a blood cure so it’s extremely debateable whether he should be rushing into anything either.

On the other hand, he knows _Dean_ and admittedly, working is a better coping strategy than alcohol or any other of his brother’s self-destructive behaviours, so before he knows it, he’s said yes.

Just like that, the Winchesters are back in business.

OoOoO

“Okay, so this is the place,” Dean says, and it’s clear that he’s preparing to relish every _second_ of Sam’s misery as he gestures towards the brightly painted facade of Freddy Fazbear’s Pizza. “I mean, what bad shit could _possibly_ go down here?”

Sam closes his eyes and breaths slowly out of his nose. He’s dimly aware of his brother’s throaty laugh beside him as he massages his temples.

“Come on, Sam. Don’t tell me you’re not a _little_ bit intrigued? Mysterious deaths and – get this – not a single night watchman has stuck this job out for more than five days. Cheer up, Sammy; not everywhere’s like Plucky Pennywhistle’s, you know.”

“No, this place is _worse!_ ” Sam fires back, glaring at Dean. 

Dean fixes him with a look which makes him want to hit something – mainly Dean, if he’s honest. Dean, however, seems to realise that he’s on the fast track to becoming a victim of fratricide and curbs his amusement. 

“Look, Sam. I reckon I can handle this on my own if you wanna sit it out...”

“No, it’s fine. I just don’t see why we can’t go in in Fed threads.”

“Because there’s no obvious reason for the Feds to be here, so the night watchman job makes more sense,” Dean says wearily, like he’s getting fed up of having to explain himself. “Come on, Sam – I went to a friggin’ _job interview_ to get us through the door here. My first shift is tonight, so we’ve only got today to check the place out.”

“Okay, _okay_.” Sam reaches for the handle. “Let’s go and get it over with. Then I want to get drunk. _Really_ drunk.”

Dean laughs as he mirrors Sam exiting the car. “That’s the spirit, Sammy. That’s the spirit.”

OoOoO

Freddy Fazbear’s ticks every box for Sam - if the topic is ‘things he would happily burn with fire’. It’s too bright, too noisy and the staff are relentlessly cheerful in a way that can only be achieved with drugs or desperation. The icing on this particularly shitty cake is the animatronics that have given Fazbear’s its brand identity and helped it stay in business for so long. 

Aside from the eponymous Freddy Fazbear, there’s an oversized rabbit called Bonnie and a bird called Chica that Sam can’t figure out if it’s supposed to be a duck or a chicken. Either way he’s pretty sure that it shouldn’t have fucking _teeth_. He tries to look inconspicuous while he watches these nightmarish things interact with hoards of excited children and mentally catalogues all the places he’d rather be instead of here.

The main part of the restaurant has rows of tables designed for children’s parties with multiple guests. Sam’s also discovered a separate area called Pirate’s Cove. The walls are painted with a seafaring scheme and the lack of furniture indicates that it’s probably where they have party games and the like. There’s a circular stage at one end, which is curtained off when not in use.

He jumps when he realises that Dean is now standing beside him. If he’s hoping that his brother didn’t notice him flinch, he quickly realises he’s shit out of luck when Dean laughs and claps him heartily on the shoulder. 

“Don’t tell me you’re not having fun, Sammy? This place is awesome.”

“Fuck you, Dean,” he mutters, although unfortunately, not quietly enough judging by the glare fired at him by a woman trying to corral four giggling children to the exit. Wisely, they wait until she’s gone before heading out themselves. 

“So what’s the deal then?” he asks once they’re in the parking lot in the hope that he can distract Dean from his _schadenfreude-fest._

“Not much. The place closes at ten, the employees are usually done by about half past and then it’s me watching the cameras with whatever reading material a red-blooded single American guy chooses to pass the hours with until six a.m.”

Sam makes a face at his brother’s one track mind, even though he knows Dean is joking. They’ve no idea whether there’s a hunt here or not, but Dean’s too much of a seasoned professional to be caught with his pants around his ankles.

“You think there _is_ something?” he asks while the thought is still fresh in his mind. He glances to his left in time to catch Dean’s shrug. 

“The last guy certainly thinks there is.”

_No shit_ , thinks Sam. They’ve both had dealings with people whom the average person on the street would describe as ‘batshit’, but the previous night watchman was in a whole new league of his own, even for them. When Dean had gotten wind of the case via the internet it seemed logical to try and get it straight from the horse’s mouth. Personally, Sam thought the interview went brilliantly – if you were looking for a reason to ditch a case, because what the poor guy was saying was frankly _ridiculous_.

He’d seen the gleam in Dean’s eyes when they’d left the psychiatric facility though – for Dean all the incoherent rambling simply confirmed that there was something worth looking into here. _You heard him, Sammy; that place made him go crazy._

He’d reluctantly come to the same conclusion when they’d then researched Mark Chase. Freddy Fazbear’s previous security guard had been destined for great things – a high flyer who had the pick of college places until he’d taken a part time job as night watchman at the local pizza place. Now the college dreams must seem like a dim and distant memory, his days spent in a drug-induced haze within the four walls of the secure psychiatric facility he was placed in following a spectacular psychotic break.

Whatever had gone on between the hours of ten p.m. and six a.m. on the five nights he had worked at Freddy Fazbear’s, it had conclusively shattered the brilliant mind of Mark Chase. 

“So this is the plan,” Dean says, drawing him from his thoughts. “I’ve gotta go to the office when I arrive for my shift and there’ll be all the information I need to survive the night.”

Sam frowns. “They didn’t actually _say_ that, did they?”

“Ha, yeah, maybe not the best choice of wording,” Dean agrees, apparently amused by the idea. They reach the car. “Seriously, this has got to be the freakiest employment I’ve ever had.”

“You realise you’ve never actually _had_ a job, Dean?”

Dean ponders this for a moment, like the thought has never actually occurred to him. “Thirty five and I’ve never actually worked for a living. Dunno if I should be proud of that or not.”

Sam’s expression makes his feelings on the matter clear, even though he’s second mate in _exactly_ the same boat. 

With nothing else to do until closing time, they drive back to the motel to wait for the start of Dean’s first shift.

OoOoO

_First Night_

Dean locks the kitchen door behind the final two Freddy Fazbear’s employees. He ignores the weird looks they give him in favour of getting out his cell and calling Sam to tell him that the coast is clear. Barely five minutes pass before there’s a knock at the door and he opens it to see Sam’s stony face on the other side. Dean grins and steps aside.

“Welcome to my humble place of employment, Sammy.”

They head through the kitchens, down a dimly lit corridor and into the office. There are twenty minutes before the lights automatically shut off and Dean’s shift officially starts. 

“Here, check this out,” Dean says, suddenly veering down a different corridor. He throws open a door and there they are. 

“Fuck,” Sam breathes in the absence of anything more insightful to say, because if anything the animatronics look even worse when they’re still and silent and cloaked in shadow.

“Nice, huh?”

He glances at Dean and decides not to ask if his brother _wants_ Mark Chase’s story to be true, because the look on Dean’s face is answer enough. He ignores Dean’s comment.

“We need to get to the office so you can show me the security system before the lights go out.”

Dean seems to weigh up whatever he’s going to say next and instead opts for a quick nod. “It’s this way.”

OoOoO

The office is sandwiched between two corridors, with access points on the east and west walls. Curiously, the sliding doors are reinforced steel affairs, leading Sam to wonder if the building had been something else before it became a pizza restaurant. The office itself is unsurprisingly unspectacular – a collection of mismatched battered furniture, overflowing paperwork trays and walls filled with every poster, flyer and memo every issued by and to the management. Sam ignores the large Freddy Fazbear’s promotional poster with the staring, dead eyes of the company’s mascots as he listens to Dean talking about what he knows – which turns out is very little.

“Apparently there should be a message or something,” Dean says, digging around in the detritus of the day shift. Sam frowns as a half-eaten burrito is uncovered, because the employees of Freddy Fazbear’s are _seriously messy bastards_. Dean locates the memory stick with a small ‘ha’ of triumph and sets about plugging it into the ancient computer that’s taking up significant amounts of space on the desk. There’s one audio file on the storage device, which Sam starts running after checking the speaker isn’t muted on the machine.

A voice eventually floats out of the white noise, which they both recognise as Mark Chase’s. They exchange glances because he sounds like a regular young guy – a little bored and a lot amused to be leaving the message. In short, nothing like the wreck of a human being that they met several weeks ago. 

‘ _Uh, okay. I’ve been asked to leave a message to help you get settled in on your first night. I worked this job before you and I’m just finishing up here... so anyway. Let’s see about getting you through your first night. There’s an introductory greeting that I’m supposed to read to you from the company, it’s kind of a legal thing so here goes..._ ’

Sam zones out at this point until he hears the word ‘animatronic’, followed by Dean’s snort when Mark talks about how they can get a bit ‘quirky’ at night. The ex-employee then suggests giving them a little respect although he sounds slightly scathing when he says it. He then goes onto explain how the characters have a ‘free roaming mode’ at night so their servers don’t lock up. 

Despite the apparent levity, the voice says the main issue as night watchman here is that, at night, the animatronics will mistake humans for metal endo-skeletons that are out of their suits. As this is strictly against the rules here at Freddy Fazbear’s, they’ll try to force the offending animatronic back into a costume, which is evidently hazardous to a person’s health ‘due to the metal crossbeams and other structures inside the suit’. They exchange glances again. _Don’t worry though,_ the voice cheerfully informs them. _You’ll pretty much almost certainly be okay._

Apparently the best way to stay safe from these wandering (and apparently murderous) animatronics is to stay in the office and close the doors. Sounds easy enough, except the doors are weird powered things that have to be closed by the press of a button within the office and can’t _stay_ closed because they use too much juice and will run out the supply in the generator that keeps the place running overnight. 

Put simply, if they use all the electricity keeping the doors shut, the lights will go out and the doors will spring open for good, leaving them at the mercy of Freddy Fazbear and his fucked up friends. The idea is they should use the cameras to keep an eye on the animatronics and only close the doors when any of them wander close enough to the office to be a threat.

The audio file finishes and Sam leans back on the chair heavily. Dean huffs a laugh and shakes his head like he’s trying to work out if this is the weirdest case they’ve worked or if a unicorn shooting rainbows out of its ass still takes the top prize.

“So...” But before Dean can finish whatever it is he’s about to say, there’s a series of clunks that echo throughout the empty building as the main lighting system powers down for the night and the generator kicks in. Thirty seconds later, they’re sitting in near darkness, the office lit by a pathetic desk lamp and the glow of the computer monitor that displays the CCTV footage from the different areas of the restaurant. 

Since he’s nearest, Sam leans forwards and hits ‘Enter’ on the keyboard, which changes the camera. He scrolls through the feed, studying each of the darkened rooms for a few seconds before moving on. Dean leans in and watches too. Each room is quiet and with nothing to see he doesn’t linger, although it’s inevitable that his finger pauses when he reaches the room where the animatronics are. Some areas of restaurant have cameras with an audio feed, some have picture, but no sound.

One of the cameras isn’t working, but the sound plays just fine – although currently there’s nothing to hear except general background noise. There’s a camera above both of the office doors that allows him to see what’s coming towards them on each of the two corridors.

Dean yawns and his jaw cracks. Sam makes a face.

“I’ll take the first watch,” he says wearily. “You go and get a little shut-eye.”

Dean doesn’t argue and goes to make himself comfortable on the other chair. He grumbles for a few minutes about how he’ll never be able to sleep on this _torture device_ , before promptly falling asleep. Sam rolls his eyes and returns to systematically clicking through the camera feeds.

OoOoO

He’s not sure how long he’s been doing it for when he realises that something is different. He’s gotten to the point that he’s clicking through so fast, he has to backtrack a little until he finds the camera he wants. Surprise, surprise - it’s the room where the animatronics are kept.

“Crap...” he breathes as his eyes rake over the dimly lit scene. Freddy Fazbear and Bonnie the rabbit are still exactly where he found them... but Chica is nowhere to be seen. The muttered profanity wakes Dean, who blinks and, seeing Sam hunched over the monitor with a deep frown on his face, gets up to come and have a look for himself.

“It’s gone,” Sam announces, gesturing at the screen.

“What’s gone?”

“The Big Bird... uh, fucking _Chica_. It was there and now it’s gone.”

Dean rolls his shoulders and tips his head one way and then the other until he hears a satisfying crack. “So where is it then?”

“I’m looking,” Sam snaps. He’s clicking through the camera feeds so fast that he’s unprepared when he reaches the one that displays the dining area. Or he _would_ be looking at the dining area, if he could see past Chica, who is staring straight into the camera from only several inches away.

Sam inhales sharply. Beside him Dean gives a low whistle.

“Well ain’t that some crazy shit?”

Sam flicks through the camera feeds again, but everything is exactly the same. Chica remains unmoving, staring at them down the camera lens like it’s teleported there.

“Maybe it’s like those weeping angel things?” Dean says suddenly.

“Excuse me?”

“You know, off that Dr. Who show.”

Sam realises that his brother has basically read his mind in pondering how the animatronic moved so quickly and so silently to its new position.

“You think they only move when no one’s watching them?”

Dean shrugs, since it’s as good a theory as any. “I dunno. Either way, it’s no wonder Mark Chase’s marbles went missing, don’t you think?”

Sam makes a noncommittal noise, but his eyes never leave the screen. His first instinct is to slam the office doors closed because the thought of any of those fucking _things_ coming in here is abhorrent, but he’s heard the instructions and six a.m. is a _long_ way away, so the doors will have to stay open until they’re in imminent danger. He realises that Dean is speaking again.

“You want me to take over?”

“Huh? No, it’s okay. Don’t think I’d be able to sleep anyway.”

Silence reigns, save for the sound of Sam clicking through the camera feeds. After a while, he glances around at Dean, thinking his brother must have gone back to sleep, but Dean is staring off into space, a strange expression on his face.

“Dean? You okay?”

Dean wipes a hand across his face, like the action will snap him out of whatever thoughts he’s gotten lost in. 

“Yeah, just... yeah.”

“You’re not having second thoughts about us taking this case are you, because we can just walk-”

Irritation floods his brother’s features. “Hey, I’m not the one with the busted wing.”

“I know, but you’ve been through a lot-”

“ _Sam,_ ” Dean snaps. “Quit trying to psychoanalyze me, okay? What d’you want me to tell you, huh? That I’m gonna have a nervous breakdown? I know you think we need to talk about everything, but we don’t. I was a demon and now I’m not; it doesn’t sound complicated to me.” Dean gestures towards the monitor, temporarily forgotten. “Besides, the _last_ place we should be having deep an’ meaningfuls is in the middle of a job.”

Sam spins around and cycles back through the feeds quickly, but fortunately none of the animatronics have decided to take advantage of his momentary lapse in concentration. Sam also knows a shut down when he hears one so he leaves Dean to his not-brooding and turns his attention back toward making sure that they don’t get killed by crazed robotic puppets.

Turns out he needn’t have worried. Chica and then eventually Bonnie move around the restaurant throughout the early hours, but neither stray into the corridors that could bring them toward the office. Sam eventually relinquishes the controls to Dean, concerned that his growing tiredness might cause him to miss something, but overall the night is completely uneventful, save for the tension that encircles them both. 

OoOoO

“You know, Dean, as crazy as the whole situation is there, I don’t think it’s a case for us.”

Dean looks away from the TV, across the motel room to where Sam is sitting in front of his laptop. His expression says that he’s waiting for Sam to explain himself, so Sam duly obliges. 

“It’s just, it’s _fact_ that those things are programmed to roam at night. There’s just nothing that’s our kind of strange about it.”

Dean makes a face. “Two previous night watchmen died, and the last one could now be an extra in _One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest_. In recent years, not one night watchman has lasted longer than five nights? Yeah, nothing strange about that, Sammy.”

“But-”

“Hang on, you haven’t heard the best part. I managed to get into the room where the animatronics are kept while they’re between parties. The EMF meter went _crazy_.” Dean studies Sam’s less than impressed face in amusement. “Programmed, _my ass_.”

Sam sighs deeply, because Dean’s summation of events puts it firmly back in their wheelhouse. A lifetime hunting says that coincidences are rarer than rocking horse shit so yeah, they’re going back tonight.

OoOoO

_Second Night_

There’s very little to separate Dean’s second shift from the previous night; the employees leave, the lights go out and, after a period of inactivity, the animatronics start to move. This time they’re ready, and rather than taking it in turns to keep watch, they work together, one at the monitors and the other checking the darkened hallways outside the office, before swapping over. 

Occasionally some of the animatronics come onto the corridors – there’s a hairy moment when Dean is checking the opposite door and Sam at the last moment spies Bonnie making her way towards them on the other corridor. He slams the door just as the psychotic rabbit reaches the office. Neither of them speak as it bangs on the barrier for a moment before wandering away again. When Sam checks the cameras again before letting the door reopen, the character is now in the kitchens.

Six a.m. rolls around and they leave the restaurant. There’s a sense of accomplishment that they survived the night without too much drama and they’re starting to get a handle on the animatronics movements, but they’re no further on in working out _why_ they’re so violent.

“We need to go and see Mark Chase again,” Sam says stifling a yawn as best he can as they sit side by side in the car. When his brother doesn’t respond, he glances over in time to see Dean shifting uncomfortably, his hand pressed to his chest.

“You okay?”

Dean straightens quickly, frown evaporating into something more neutral. His hand moves from beneath his jacket to rest on the steering wheel.

“Indigestion. So you wanna head back to the nut house?”

Sam glances at his watch. _6.20 a.m._ “I’ll call and try and arrange a visit in a couple hours. First – sleep or food?”

He’s expecting Dean to pick breakfast, but his brother starts the engine and pulls out of the parking lot in the direction of the motel.

“Sleep it is then.”

OoOoO

Sam phones the psychiatric facility at a more civilised hour. The call is brief and significant enough for him to wake Dean, who is sleeping deeply, one arm slung across his face.

“Hey.” He hits his brother’s leg a little harder. “Dean, wake up.”

Dean makes a series of disgruntled noises as he stirs. His gaze eventually lands on Sam who’s trying to wrestle one-armed into his grey Fed slacks. This pulls him back to wakefulness. He coughs first to find his voice.

“What is it?”

“I just rang the hospital to arrange for us to interview Mark Chase again. We can’t.”

“Because of that douchebag doctor?”

“Because he’s dead.”

Dean, who’d been slowly starting to mirror Sam’s actions by getting dressed, pauses and looks up. His expression indicates that he’s taking a while to process this, which is fair enough given that he’s just woken up. He rubs a hand across his lower jaw.

“Yeah, this case isn’t weird at _all_ , Sammy.”

Sam scowls hard before bending to scoop up Dean’s shirt, which he tosses at him, ensuring that it hits Dean in the face. “Just get dressed. We’re going back to find out what’s going on.”

OoOoO

Mark Chase’s death is already being called a suicide, which surprises neither of them. With hindsight, it’s a good job they decided to go as Feds first time round, as it makes getting back into Belleview Psychiatric Hospital much easier. Mark Chase’s body is already with the medical examiner, but they’re able to interview several staff members, including the shaken attendant who was the lucky individual who discovered that Mark Chase had found a way to ensure that all his blood left his body with no hope of putting it back in.

Understandably the scene is pretty grim - unless, of course, the room was red to begin with. They step carefully across the blood-soaked linoleum. There’s a cop on the door, but he’s deliberately looking in the other direction. Sam can’t exactly blame him, and it’s an enormous help when he’s covertly trying to scan for EMF. 

“Hey.”

Sam turns to where Dean is crouched down. “What is it?”

Dean doesn’t respond for a moment. He’s frowning and his lips are moving, like he’s sounding something out, but when he sees that he’s got Sam’s attention, he beckons him over.

“What does that say to you?”

Sam looks now, then realises what Dean is seeing on the blood-smeared furniture.

“It looks like it says... ‘Purple Man’?”

Dean nods, satisfied. “That was my guess too.”

“Why would Mark write ‘Purple Man’ in his own blood?” Sam muses out loud. Dean stands suddenly, his knees popping with the movement. 

“I guess that’s what we need to find out.”

OoOoO

“So it turns out,” Sam says, an hour later when they’re driving away from the hospital, copies of Mark Chase’s files resting in his lap, “Mark mentioned the ‘Purple Man’ in every single session he had since he was admitted. According to these notes, he was frightened about ‘what the Purple Man had done’.”

“But he didn’t say what that was?”

“No.”

“Figures,” Dean says grumpily. “So this ‘Purple Man’ - I’m guessing he wasn’t any more specific about who that might be either?”

Sam consults the notes again. “Nope. There’s one session where he talked about the Purple Man having, uh, something gold on his chest, but that’s it. No name, no physical description, nothing.”

Dean’s eyes never leave the road, but Sam catches his frown all the same and waits for his brother to say what’s on his mind. 

“I wonder why he never mentioned the Purple Man when we interviewed him?”

“Dunno. He was on some seriously powerful drugs when we met him, Dean.”

Silence reigns for a few moments. Dean taps the steering wheel to an imaginary song before hitting the turn signal as they reach the motel.

“So d’you think the Purple Man is connected with Fazbear’s?” he asks as he guides the car into the same parking space that they left earlier that morning.

“You mean like an employee?”

“Yeah. It could be a uniform.”

Sam nods thoughtfully. “From what we’ve seen they all wear red in line with the company branding, but it’s worth looking into.”

Despite having brought the car to a complete stop, Dean doesn’t turn the engine off, instead turning an expectant gaze on his brother. “Well, I’ll let you get right on it. I, on the other hand, am going to find us some breakfast.”

OoOoO

When Dean returns thirty minutes later, Sam is back in jeans and a shirt and is so engrossed in whatever he’s reading, he doesn’t look up when the door opens. Dean deposits Sam’s coffee in front of him on the small formica table and moves to change out of his own suit.

“You find anything?” he asks, kicking off his shoes and giving his toes an experimental wiggle. 

“Nothing yet, but I’ve emailed a guy that wrote an article about the place in the early eighties and... uh...”

“And?” Dean replies impatiently.

“And... uh,” Sam frowns at his laptop and then sits back. “Oh crap.”

“ _What?_ ”

“The guy I emailed just replied. He doesn’t have much in the way of information, but he did send me a photo.”

Dean crosses the room and leans over Sam’s shoulder. The image on the screen is grainy, but it depicts, presumably, the entire Freddy Fazbear’s workforce standing proudly outside the restaurant on a clear summer’s day. It doesn’t take a genius to work out what Sam has found so distracting. Amongst the perky smiling faces one stands out. He’s older, not smiling and he’s not dressed like the rest of them in their red striped shirts and black slacks.

His purple-blue uniform makes him look like a cop. The gold badge on his chest completes the look.

Dean breathes and then huffs a soft laugh that puffs the hair near Sam’s ear. “Well, for ten points can you name an occupation that likes to dress up as a pseudo-cop?”

“Night watchman?”

“Top prize is yours, Sammy.”

Sam nods thoughtfully. This is good. This is a _lead_. “Okay, well, Should be easy enough to find out who this guy is and then we can find out what the hell he did that made Mark Chase kill himself.”

OoOoO

Sam goes to Freddy Fazbear’s alone. Dean’s face is familiar with the dayshift since he went for the interview for the night watchman position, so there’s no point in him turning up pretending to be someone else. Sam goes in his suit, sounds appropriately officious and with no fuss he’s perusing the company employee records. It doesn’t take him long to find the files he wants.

Dennis Strauss was the night watchman at Freddy Fazbear’s from 1979 to 1983. His employee record is exemplary with no incidents or infractions - until he was abruptly fired on August third, 1983. Significantly, after Dennis’s dismissal, the restaurant closed for a while.

“What makes a man with a clean record suddenly get fired?” Sam muses to himself. He doesn’t realize that someone has entered the office and is looking at the photo over his shoulder.

“Oh my God, that’s Dennis the Menace!”

He jumps and turns an irritated glare on the owner of the voice. She’s young, late teens maybe and his reaction makes her jump too. Her expression is apologetic and she’s holding a coffee that sloshes slightly. The name tag on her uniform reads ‘Melissa’. His gaze softens.

“Sorry, you startled me,” he says, finding a reassuring smile.

“Sorry. Just wanted to bring you a drink,” she replies, holding out the cup. She’s too young to flirt with him so he figures the sling must have won him some sympathy.

“You know this guy?” he asks, gesturing at the file.

“Not personally, since, you know, child of the nineties an’ all that? But my mom worked here then and she told me all about him.”

“Yeah? Any chance I could talk to your mom, Melissa?”

She brightens, like she’s happy she can help him. “Sure. I can give her a call for you.”

OoOoO

He calls Dean on his way to the address Melissa has given him. Although Dean insists that he hasn’t, he sounds as if he’s just woken up. Sam pictures his brother and realises that Dean has been looking a little pale recently. He asks Dean if he’s okay even though he knows before he’s asked the question that Dean will say he is. He tells Dean to take it easy and that he’ll call once he knows more.

Melissa and her mom, Angela live about fifteen minutes drive from the restaurant. He finds the house and parks up outside, the front door opening before he’s even made it up the path. The family resemblance is obvious. He introduces himself and she invites him in. 

“So you want to know about Dennis,” Angela says as she hands him his coffee and sits down across from him in the homely-looking family room.

“If you don’t mind, ma’am,” he replies with an easy smile. “Your daughter said that you told her stories about him. He obviously had something of a reputation when you worked there.”

“That he did.” Angela shudders as she cradles her own coffee mug. “You know those guys who just give off creepy vibes? Dennis did it in _spades_. He was night watchman at first, but then he started to look after the character suits so he was around during the day sometimes too. Back then they weren’t as hi-tech as they are today, you understand, but they still required regular maintenance. He set himself up in a little workshop in a storage area, but he was just one of those guys you avoided like the plague, you know? Aside from him, I have really happy memories of the time I worked there.”

“Were there any specific incidents that you remember concerning Dennis?”

Angela shrugs and studies her coffee for a moment. She looks uncomfortable about what she’s going to say next. 

“Like I said, I didn’t interact with him much, but there were rumours. Some children went missing in early ’83. The only connection between them was the last place they were seen, which was at Fazbear’s. Creepy guy, missing children. I’m sure you can guess what the rumours were.”

Sam nods. “What do _you_ think, Angela?”

“I think we were barely kids ourselves and you know what a bunch of teenage girls can be like.” She offers him an apologetic smile. “Sorry, my mother used to tell me not to speak ill of the dead.”

Sam’s pulse quickens slightly, not that anything shows on his face. “Strauss is dead?”

If possible, Angela looks even more uncomfortable. “Yeah... the management weren’t happy about the rumours, even completely unsubstantiated ones like those, so they fired him. Understandably, Dennis was angry so it seems he sneaked back in one night before the new night watchman started. The police thought he was trying to vandalise the animatronics to get his revenge, but...”

“But?”

Angela places her empty cup on the coffee table and self-consciously smoothes her skirt. “Dennis was apparently messing with Foxy.”

“Foxy? I haven’t seen that one.”

“You won’t have. They de-commissioned him after Dennis’s, uh, accident.”

“Accident?”

“They think Dennis was looking inside the mouth when the mechanism failed. It snapped shut on his head, killing him instantly. Poor Brian... he was the guy who found him the next morning.”

It’s clear the memory still haunts her and Sam feels bad for making her talk about it.

“I’m sorry, Angela, but I’ve just one more question.”

She forces a smile. “Go ahead.”

“You, uh, don’t happen to know where Strauss is buried, do you?”

OoOoO

Turns out she doesn’t, but it’s not the hardest bit of research he’s ever had to do. Dennis Strauss is buried in a cemetery about an hour’s drive away so the next thing they need to do is decide what they do now.

“If there’s nothing to tie him to the actual restaurant, then we’ve gotta assume that salting his corpse will do it,” Dean says from his position on the bed, his fingers laced behind his head. 

“Well yeah. Fazbear’s apparently got rid of Foxy after Dennis’ death and the cemetery confirmed that he was buried rather than cremated so it make sense.”

“What a way to go,” Dean muses to himself. “No wonder his spirit’s pissed. Probably sees his successors as stealing his job and by killing them, he can still get back at Freddy Fuckbear’s by giving their reputation a good kicking.” Dean sits up suddenly and cracks his knuckles. “Guess I’ve got a date with a shovel and six feet of brown stuff, huh?”

“We should both go,” Sam says for not the first time. He’s trying to study Dean without making it too obvious, because there’s _something_ he can’t quite put his finger on about his brother. Dean, frustratingly, shakes his head.

“Doesn’t make sense. You can’t do any digging with your shoulder and besides, if you’re at the restaurant, you’ll be able to confirm that those things have stopped moving.”

The creeping doubt that he’d felt when Dean first suggested taking the case resurfaces once more. He’s trying to comprehend why here and why now, but then Dean says, _Aw, Sammy. Don’t tell me you’re scared of being there on your own?_ and the indignation conveniently drowns out the warning bells. 

OoOoO

_Third Night_

Since Dean is the one in Freddy Fazbear’s employ, he has to turn up for his shift as usual. Like the previous two evenings, he waits until the coast is clear to let Sam in, and they head to the office together.

“You gonna be okay?” Dean asks as Sam settles himself in his now-familiar seat behind the monitor.

“Yeah, it’s just like playing a video game,” Sam replies, his hand hovering over the buttons that open and close the doors to make his point. “How about you?”

Dean makes a face, like he can’t quite work out why he’s being asked such a stupid question before it evidently dawns on him. “I’m cured, Sammy. _You_ cured me.” He pats his body for emphasis. “Not a demon, okay?”

_That’s not it_ , Sam thinks. Or not _completely_ it, anyway. Now’s not the time to risk an argument though, so instead he just says, “be careful.”

“You too,” Dean replies, already half way out the door.

Sam watches him go and sighs, before he turns his attention towards the monitor. The animatronics are still for now. He glances at his watch – twenty minutes until lights out. It’s too much to hope that they won’t move at _all_ , but he mentally crosses his fingers that he’ll be in for a quiet night. He reminds himself too that if Dean can get Dennis Strauss’s corpse salted and burned then there’s an excellent chance that he won’t have to spend the entire night trying to avoid being murdered by possessed animatronics.

OoOoO

Dean phones to say he’s arrived at the cemetery. He has a rough idea where the grave is, so the hardest part should be the actual physical labour of digging up and smashing open a coffin. He tells Sam that he’ll call back the second it’s done.

The whole time they’ve been speaking, Sam has been watching the cameras. Chica has been the most active and is currently loitering in the shadows in the main party area. Bonnie has moved into the small store cupboard and is frozen in a ridiculous pose playing an inflatable guitar. He yawns. _So far, so insane._

He leans back and realises that there’s a piece of paper sticking out from under the computer hard drive, like someone had maybe propped it up against the screen and it had slid underneath. He pulls on it, realising that it’s a note.

_Night watchman – there’s a message on the answer phone for you._

There’s no date on the note, but when he glances at the machine, the red light is blinking indicating that there’s still a message on there. He hits the button, all the while keeping an eye on the screen while he cycles between the CCTV cameras. The answer phone tells him the message was left last night. He plays it, instantly realising that he’s hearing the voice of the late Mark Chase.

_Uh hey, I uh, forgot to mention something when I left the original instructions..._

Sam continues to click as he listens to the now dead ex-employee. It’s weird to think that maybe only an hour or so after the message was left, Mark Chase killed himself. All the animatronics are where he left them so he carries on listening and clicking. Party room. Kitchens. Store Cupboard. Pirate Cove.

_Think my mind’s going, but hey, sanity’s overrated, huh?_

Sam’s already on the next screen when he realises that he’s seen something that requires greater scrutiny. He clicks back to Pirate Cove. The camera shows the curtain that closes off this area when it’s not in use, and to his recollection, he’s never seen any of the animatronics in here. Now there’s a pair of eyes peering out of the curtains towards the camera.

_So uh, yeah, anyway, I just needed to warn you about Foxy._

Sam’s pulse quickens as he sweeps back through the other cameras and accounts for Bonnie, Chica and Freddy, all in other parts of the restaurant.

_Foxy, uh, he isn’t used in the restaurant anymore. His circuitry is screwed to hell and the management decided he’s not safe to be around kids._

He flicks back to Pirate Cove and now there’s a full head sticking out from between the curtains. He’d have to be blind not to know what kind of animal it’s supposed to be.

_Hell, Foxy’s not safe to be around anybody. You need to be careful though – he can move really fast._

Sam stares at the screen. He needs to check the other feeds to ensure he’s not in danger from any of the other characters, but he’s transfixed by Foxy’s maniacal grin. He hits the keyboard, rapidly cycling through the cameras. Evidently it’s not quick enough – when he returns to Pirate Cove, Foxy has emerged from behind the curtain and is standing, head tilted at an unnatural angle as he gazes into the camera. He looks as if he’s waving, although Sam thinks it’s more an opportunity to display the wicked looking hook he has instead of a hand.

“Come on, Dean,” he says under his breath. _Come on._

As if his brother can hear him, his cell phone starts to ring. He answers it and Dean’s voice comes on the line sounding both breathless and adrenaline-filled.

“Hey, Sammy, it’s all done. How’s it goin’ there?”

“Uh,” Sam says rapidly flicking through the camera feeds again. “I, uh...” He hits Pirate Cove but Foxy is gone. Two further clicks and he lands on the camera for the east corridor, just in time to see a shadowy figure sprinting down it in the direction of the office. He drops the phone, still connected with Dean in a pitch black cemetery somewhere, as he scrambles for the button to close the door.

_“Sam? Hey, Sammy? You still there. Sam, talk to me. Sam!”_


	2. Chapter 2

It feels like an eternity before Sam can breathe again. He stays frozen for a moment, hand slammed down on the button that has closed the door and saved his life. Over the hammering on the steel, he hears Dean’s voice on the line, speaking with increasing urgency. Coming back to himself, he bends over and picks up his cell.

“Hey. I’m here.”

“Sammy, what the fuck? I thought one of those things had got you.”

“It nearly did. Foxy-”

“ _Foxy?_ I thought that was the one-”

“I know. It might have been decommissioned, but it’s still _here_.”

“So what? You thinking Strauss’s remains could be tied to that?”

The banging on the door starts up again. Sam glances at the overnight generator’s power meter and groans. There’s only twenty percent left to last him through to six a.m. so he’s gonna have to hope that Foxy decides to return to Pirate Cove and _soon_.

“Yeah, I’m thinking so,” he replied, remembering that Dean had asked a question.

“Shit,” Dean growls breathlessly, and Sam realises that his brother is now running. “Just hold tight. I’ll be back as soon as I can.”

“Holding tight,” Sam replies wearily as the line goes dead.

He realises that the banging has stopped. He flicks through the camera feeds, but although Bonnie and Chica and Freddy are easily spotted, Foxy is nowhere to be seen. His eyes flick to the power meter – it’s draining too quickly. He knows he’s going to have to let the door go, but there’s a chance Foxy could still be waiting on the other side. On the other hand, Foxy could have gone and he’s just sitting here wasting valuable electricity.

He reaches for the shotgun Dean left him with and lets the button go...

OoOoO

Dean arrives at the restaurant as the sun is started to appear on the horizon. They’ve kept in contact throughout his journey and since Foxy has gone back into hiding, Sam tells him that he doesn’t need to bother busting in there. The regular power supply kicks in at six a.m. and then they’ve usually got a forty five minute window before the shift manager arrives to take over. For reasons they can’t fathom, the animatronics return to their room when the main power comes on, so Dean, who is technically the company’s night watchman, is free to enter the restaurant and be back on duty.

Sam waits in the car until Dean emerges. As Dean walks across the parking lot he takes the opportunity to observe his brother, but he still can’t figure out what’s troubling him. Once again, he finds himself wishing that he’d tried to talk Dean out of looking for a hunt. Although it doesn’t sit easy with him either, he wonders if he should try to talk Dean into walking away, just this time.

Unsurprisingly, the conversation never happens. Dean’s too preoccupied with trying to figure out what’s going on with Freddy Fazbear’s and, admittedly, Sam’s easily sucked into strategizing because he’s got a whole host of unanswered questions himself.

“So Strauss must be tied to Foxy since burning his remains did nothing,” Dean says around his coffee. “You said it took his head off?”

“Apparently so.”

“Okay, well I think we should try and sneak in and burn it.”

Sam frowns, not certain that he’s following Dean correctly. “You mean today, during the day?”

Dean shrugs. “Works for me. Once it’s gone, problem solved.”

“We’re not setting fire to something in the middle of the day, in a restaurant full of people, Dean!”

His brother rolls his eyes. “You can’t dig up graves in the middle of the day, Dean, you can’t set things on fire in the middle of the day, Dean. Seriously, Sam, is there anything I _can_ do?”

Sam fires his best death glare, for all the good it does.

“Okay,” Dean says, apparently oblivious to his brother’s daggers. “How about I meet you half way; we sneak in and find the flea-ridden piece of shit and give him a kerosene bath. Then tonight we can wait til he comes out of hiding and introduce him to my blow torch.”

“And risk burning the entire restaurant down? Besides, what if someone notices the smell before tonight?”

It’s evident Dean’s not sure why he should really care since it’s just _stuff_ , but he’s prepared to at least come up with a plan they can both get behind.

“Okay, how about we make sure he’s good and flammable when he’s not going to try and take our heads off, but then overnight, you man the cameras and I’ll wait just outside that fire exit on the east corridor. When he leaves Pirate Cove, you give me the signal and I’ll throw open the door. He’s not gonna be able to resist coming after me if you close the office door so I can torch him in the great outdoors. As for your other question, if someone follows the smell, they’ll probably do us a favour and chuck him outside anyway. You wanna go with that instead?”

_No_ , Sam thinks, _I want us both to get in the car and get the fuck away from this crazy case because something’s not right._ His shoulder aches dully - an exclamation point to his thoughts which already echo like a warning bell. He wonders if he should try and verbalise his feelings since the frustration is starting to prove distracting and in their line of work, distraction usually gets someone killed.

“Sam? Hey! Anyone in there?” Dean says, evidently annoyed by Sam’s lack of enthusiasm for burning things.

“Yeah, sure, we’ll go with that plan,” Sam replies, turning his back on his reservations, despite their howls of indignation. “Do we have the stuff we need?”

Dean snorts. “Does Donald Trump need a new barber?”

OoOoO

The restaurant is busy when they arrive so they slip through the throngs of excited children and harassed-looking adults unnoticed. The only employee they do meet as they enter the staff-only area barely listens to Dean’s readymade excuse that he’s left something behind after his shift and has come back to get it.

There’s currently a party going on in Pirate Cove, which will conveniently drown out any noise they’re making, but also means that they need to find another way to the area behind the stage. Fortunately there’s a door leading from the employee locker room. It’s locked, but Dean makes short work of it and they’re inside in under thirty seconds. 

It’s clear that no one in Freddy Fazbear’s current employ comes back here with any regularity given the stale odour and dusty surfaces. There’s a single bulb hanging from the ceiling, which gives no real light in the windowless room. They both find their flashlights and flick them on in almost perfect synchronisation.

“I guess this is where furniture comes to die, huh?” Dean mutters as the beams of light swing left and right. 

At first it looks like there’s nothing here but old, broken tables and twisted, ripped chairs. They try to move as quietly as possible, knowing that beyond the next door there is a small anti-chamber that leads directly to Pirate Cove’s stage. Sam tries not the think about the man-sized animatronics out there entertaining the children, that now try to murder him and Dean on a nightly basis.

“This must have been where Dennis had his workshop,” he comments as his flashlight picks out a workbench and some rusting tools scattered about the floor. There’s a old mouldy armchair in one corner and he realises he doesn’t have to work hard to visualise the creepy night watchman setting himself up with a home from home, away from prying eyes.

“Aha, look what we’ve got here.”

He realises that Dean has climbed over a small mountain range of rusting furniture and is now crouching down, his flashlight shining at whatever’s under a tarp that he’s holding up with his other hand.

Mindful of his shoulder, he makes his way over there. He allows his beam to join Dean’s and illuminate the twisted wreckage that’s lain beneath the tarp for the last twenty or so years. Beside him, Dean gives a low whistle.

“Wow, he’s an ugly bastard.”

Foxy is every bit as mangled as Sam recalls from the brief view he got of him before he charged from his hiding place in Pirate Cove last night. His fur is worn and ripped in places, exposing his metal endoskeleton and the flashlight reveals the wicked-looking hook. How in the hell anyone conceived this as an appropriate character to entertain children is beyond Sam.

“You got the kerosene?” he asks, realising that he’s fully onboard with Dean’s plan now that he’s actually face to face with the thing.

“You don’t have to ask me twice,” Dean replies, handing his flashlight to Sam and reaching into his jacket for the bottle. 

Maybe he’s seen one too many horror movies, or maybe he’s just wearily familiar with the details of their lives, but Sam’s half expecting Foxy to jump up and try to kill them once Dean starts dousing him with the kerosene. Foxy however, just lies there obediently, his dead eyes staring up at them both.

“Okay. Let’s get outta here,” Dean announces once he’s done. He throws the tarp back over the animatronic and they set about slipping out of there.

OoOoO

_Fourth Night_

Despite the previous night’s events, there’s an air of anticipation that makes Sam restless while he watches the cameras. It’s occurred to him that Foxy might not even show – he didn’t even know of its _existence_ until their third night here, after all. Once again the characters start to move around after lights out. He flicks to the feed of the store room and finds himself face to face with Bonnie and almost laughs out loud at how little impact it has on him, the shock factor having long since worn off. He wonders if this could be classed as systematic desensitisation.

Dean is in position outside. Sam pictures him, all pent up energy and anticipation, yet somehow that doesn’t feel right. Dean’s just seemed... off, this entire case. He wonders again if he’s reading too much into it - after all, Dean was dead, then a demon and then endured the blood cure. He tries to tell himself it’s just that, but then his ever-analytical mind reminds him that Dean still has the Mark of Cain and he’s forced to acknowledge the dread that crawls and writhes within his stomach at the thought.

“Sammy? You there?”

He almost jumps at the sound of Dean’s voice and his eyes are drawn to his cell on the desk. They’ve decided to keep a constant connection while they’re separated this time – his cell is on charge while Dean has several of his phones so he can switch whenever the battery runs out on one. They’ve agreed not to speak too often, since Sam doesn’t want to risk breaking his concentration.

“Yeah, all quiet here. No sign of Foxy.”

“What about the others?”

“They’re moving, but they’ve only come close a couple times.”

Dean makes a noise that Sam can’t quite identify. “Well tell ‘em to hurry it up; it’s freezing out here.”

He’s about to say something because it’s only September and it’s not that cold, but the words lodge in his throat as he hits the view of Pirate Cove. The curtains are now parted slightly, revealing Foxy’s murderous grin. 

“Dean. He’s at the curtains.”

There’s a sharp cough, before a faint scraping noise comes on the line - presumably Dean easing open the fire escape. “Game on then.”

Heart rate elevating, Sam rushes through the camera feeds. As he reaches Pirate Cove, he catches a glimpse of Foxy’s ratty tail leaving the screen.

“Dean, he’s coming!” he yells, praying that his brother is ready.

“Don’t see him!” Dean yells back. 

Sam thinks _huh?_ before it suddenly dawns on him that Foxy must be coming down the _west_ corridor instead. He slams the appropriate button a split second before he’s sharing an office with a possessed animatronic. Foxy bangs twice and then there’s nothing but silence.

“Sam? _Sam?_ Talk to me! You okay?” Dean growls urgently.

“Yeah,” he breathes once he can raise his voice about the hammering of his heart. “He came down the other corridor.”

“Fuck. Back in position, huh?”

“Yeah, sorry.”

OoOoO

Sam wonders if they’ll get another shot at destroying Foxy. Two more hours pass and aside from close shaves with Freddy and Bonnie, the curtains remain firmly closed on Pirate Cove. They try to keep conversation to a minimum, but boredom creeps in and it’s inevitable that some banter occurs, but neither of them say anything that could segue into a conversation about recent events. Sam knows for certain that’s deliberate on his brother’s part.

At the other end of the phone, Dean appears to be trying to stifle a coughing fit when the inhabitant of Pirate Cove decides to show himself again. In the office, Sam sits up, anticipation curling in his veins.

“ _Dean_. He’s out again.”

“Awesome,” Dean replies without enthusiasm. “Just say the word.”

Five minutes pass. Foxy is beyond the curtain now, head tilted at that ninety degree angle as he grins at the camera. Silence pervades while Sam monitors the cameras, waiting for Foxy to come get him. _Come on, you asshole_ , he thinks, fingers poised to close the door.

Then Foxy runs.

“Dean, now!”

Whatever’s going on with Dean, his brother’s still able to bring his ‘A’ game at this point. This time, the plan goes off like a well-choreographed dance – Sam closes the office door as Dean throws open the fire exit. On the corridor, Foxy makes his run and, seeing a living, breathing human at the other end, he passes the office and heads straight for Dean.

“Come on, you asshole!” Dean yells, stepping back because he needs Foxy to leave the restaurant before he lights him up. His fears that Foxy may stop and turn around prove unfounded though – the animatronic is gunning for him and has no intention of stopping.

OoOoO

“Dean? _Dean?_ ”

In the office, Sam just hears a whole lot of noise down the phone. He lets the door spring open and is about to go to Dean’s aid when he spots Chica at the last moment, dangerously close to the west corridor.

“Fuck!” He spins on his heel and slams the button to close the other door. This is _insanity_ , he thinks and he’s just about to panic that this job is going to shit when he hears Dean’s whoop of elation, the sound coming partly down the phone and partly down the corridor.

Leaving the west door closed, he heads out. Smoke is starting the fill the corridor, but beyond it he can see into the parking lot and the ferocious flames rising into the night sky, the unrecognisable form on the ground completely engulfed.

“Awesome, huh?” Dean shouts, appearing from his left. Sam looks at his brother and almost startles at what he sees. Dean’s grinning, but his skin is flushed and his eyes are too bright.

“You okay?”

“What?”

“I said, are you okay? You look... I dunno, hot?”

Dean frowns hard, his eyes finally leaving the burning pyre. “I just set fire to a kerosene-soaked life-sized puppet and you think I look a bit _warm?_ ”

He doesn’t want to cause a fight, so Sam drops his questioning. “I’ll go back to the office and check the cameras – confirm that they’ve all stopped moving once it’s done.”

“Fine. I’ll make sure this fucker burns completely and hasn’t attracted any attention. Here, you may as well take the this.” He hands Sam the shotgun loaded with salt rounds. 

“Fine.”

OoOoO

Once Sam’s gone, Dean feels like a weight has been lifted with the removal of his brother’s scrutiny. Truth be told, he feels like _shit_. He’s obviously coming down with something and for a brief moment, he has a pang of nostalgia for his demon-self, who suffered neither illness nor injury.

He watches the animatronic being consumed by the flames until there’s nothing left and the fire eventually burns itself out. Satisfied that Dennis Strauss’ spirit will be no more, he heads inside, easing the fire exit door closed behind him. He knows he looks like shit and with the job done he figures he’ll take a quick detour to the employee locker room to clean up a little before he goes to face his brother’s take on the Spanish Inquisition. It’s easy enough to do, given that he reaches that door before the entrance to the office.

Once safely inside, he leaves the door ajar and goes to the sink to turn on the faucet. The cool water feels like heaven on his skin and he stays that way, just splashing it on his face until he realises that his phone is ringing in his pocket. He shuts off the water and answers it, eyes still closed as the droplets run down his face.

“ _Dean, Dean where the hell are you?! They’re still moving!_ ”

“ _What?_ ”

He opens his eyes and spins, just in time to see a large paw easing open the door. Freddy Fazbear’s face appears next, his comical grin hiding his deadly intentions. Dean groans.

“You're fucking kidding me...”

Evidently no one's in the mood for joking. He reaches inside his jacket for the salt canister because he _had_ to go and give Sam the shotgun, didn't he? Problem is, he doesn't even know if the salt is going to work. In his peripheral vision he can see the door that they picked earlier that day. He doesn't remember re-locking it so he makes an instant decision and runs. The animatronic moves too, but fortunately he's faster and he slams the door and locks it from the inside a split second before Freddy reaches it with a dull thump. Securing the other exit isn't an option - there's no door and beyond it lies Pirate Cove with a curtain as the only thing separating him from certain doom. 

"Dean? Are you there? Talk to me!" 

He realises that he's still connected with Sam, the phone forgotten in his jacket pocket in his grab for the salt. He drags it out and puts it to his ear, feeling strangely breathless.

"Hey, Sammy. I'm okay." Despite himself he grins as Freddy continues to pound on the door. "These fuckers are hard to kill, huh?"

"Where are you?"

"In the store room where we found Foxy."

"What? They could find you in there. You need to get out!"

"Trust me, Sam, it wouldn't have been my first choice either." 

He closes his eyes and staggers slightly. Dimly he's aware that Sam's still talking. 

"-- and we need to figure out what the hell's going on. The EMF meter's still going nuts."

He glances around and realises that he's near the area of the room that Dennis Strauss had used as his creepy guy hideaway.

"Well, lucky for us, I'm in the right place to have a look if there's anything else the old bastard's spirit might be tied to. I'll call you if I find anything, 'kay?"

"Okay. I'll do the same if I see any of them heading for Pirate Cove."

"Awesome."

He ends the call and puts the phone back in his pocket. There's an old trunk in the corner so he decides to start there. He winces as the hinges screech in protest and, once he’s certain that he’s not in imminent danger of being jumped, he shines his flashlight over the contents. Beneath some moulding clothes he finds a stack of books, most of which are true-life accounts of serial killers.

“So far, so creepy,” he mutters to himself, tossing them to one side. 

The rest of the contents are unremarkable and nothing that Dennis Strauss’ spirit might be connected to. Crouching over the trunk leaves him breathless, so he stands up and immediately feels like he’s about to pass out. The pain in his chest has intensified and he lifts his clothing to get a better look. It’s not an easy task as he has to hold his flashlight between his teeth, angled downwards so that it shines on his skin.

Even in the poor light, he can see the redness – a flaming halo around a small darkened crater. His mind issues desperate denials, but he knows instantly that he’s looking at the spot where Metatron ran him through.

On examination, he finds it hot to touch. Added to the symptoms he’s been pointedly trying to ignore for the past few days – the palpitations, the chills, the increased breathlessness - he realises that he’s probably got bigger problems than he thought. 

He lets his clothing drop and closes his eyes, all at once feeling weary and overwhelmingly _human_. He sits down heavily in the dusty old armchair and refuses to acknowledge that he doesn’t find that thought comforting. He’s instantly aware of something digging into his thigh and when he shines his flashlight down there he realises that it’s the corner of a hard-backed book that’s been jammed down the side of the cushion. He pulls it out, but the front and back covers are blank.

“What the....?” he says under his breath as he starts to turn the pages. Despite other pressing matters he realises that he’s looking at Dennis Strauss’ diary. The next thing he discovers is that all the night watchman’s serial killer books suddenly seem like _fairy stories_ compared to the contents of this anonymous-looking text.

_The first time, the rush was indescribable. To take a life, especially one considered as precious as a child..._

He groans. They should have seen it and grudgingly he acknowledges that Sam might have been right all along about it being too soon for them to be hunting. _Do your research_ , their dad used to say, a mantra he repeated so often Sam used to grumble that he’d get it engraved on John’s headstone. 

This job was supposed to be a distraction – something easy to keep them busy so that they didn’t have time to ruminate over the past few months. He can see now that they’ve done such a good job ignoring the elephant in the room, they’ve managed to overlook the crucial facts of the case too. In short, they’ve fucked up and if it doesn’t get one or both of them killed tonight then it’ll be nothing short of a miracle. 

His phone begins to ring again and he answers it, knowing it’s not likely to be good news because the frequency _that_ happens to them is up there with total eclipses and picking the winning lottery numbers.

“Dean? You okay? They’re all moving, I mean, like, I’m _watching_ them move now. Have you found anything Strauss’ spirit could be tied to because we need to get it burned _now!_ ”

He can’t help the huff of laughter that escapes his lips. 

“Forget it, Sammy. Never mind barkin’ up the wrong tree – we’re in the wrong goddamned national park.”

“What? Why?”

“I found Strauss’ diary. Those rumours that lady told you about? Totally true. Let me read you an excerpt: ‘ _the panic when I realised what I’d done... not because I’d taken a life, but because I’d almost certainly be caught and I’d never get to do it again. So I went with the only option I could see and I shoved the kid’s body inside the Foxy suit, which I’d been doing repairs on. It was so easy._ ’”

In the pause he hears Sam’s exhale, the word ‘ _shit_ ’ contained somewhere within the breath. He almost says something about not getting to the worst part yet, but he doesn’t have to because Sam will know it’s coming anyway.

“’ _So it’s become like a challenge for me. Four suits waiting to be filled. I can’t wait to get started._ ’”

The words taste toxic in his mouth. He closes the diary because there’s no need to read any more.

“Okay,” Sam says, his voice stronger now like he’s managed to shelve the horror and put his game face back on. “So we’ve gotta burn them all. We need to try and get them all in one place and then you can-”

“Uh, yeah, see there might be a problem with that, Sammy,” he replies, shifting gingerly in the chair as the pain in his chest intensifies. “I think a rain check might be necessary.”

“What? Why?” Sam asks.

“You know I said I thought I had indigestion?”

“Yeah?”

“Uh, well, it’s not indigestion.” He laughs a little, even though there’s nothing remotely funny about his situation. “I think I might have septic shock.”

“ _What?_ Dean, you know that can kill you, right?”

He huffs another laugh, even though yeah, still not funny.

“How the hell have you got septic shock, Dean?” Sam demands. “I mean, when did you even get _injured?_ ”

Dean massages his eyes even though Sam can’t see him. “Well, it’s a hell of a thing. You remember way back when, when I got into an ill-advised fight with Douche-atron? Seems like I forgot to ask him if his blade was sterilised before he ran me through with it.”

Obligingly, the wound throbs hotly as his heart flutters wildly in his chest. He can almost hear the cogs whirring in Sam’s brain as he tries to make sense of what he’s being told. 

“But... but you _died_ , Dean. The Mark resurrected you!”

“I know. That’s what threw me too, but I’ve got a theory.” He hesitates because what he’s about to say next will open conversational avenues that he’s not happy exploring, but Sam doesn’t fill the silence, so he’s no choice but to continue. 

“When I was a demon, Crowley taught me how to heal myself. Turns out it’s not something demons automatically know how to do. It has to be a _conscious_ decision, you know? I healed the wound, obviously, but I figure I didn’t heal this infection, because I didn’t even _know_ about it.”

“So you think it’s been, what... dormant the whole time?”

“Seems like.”

“So how you feeling now?”

There’s a thump from somewhere off to his left and he turns. If one of the animatronics comes into Pirate Cove then he’s fucked because he’s certain that he hasn’t got the energy to react. The noise happens again, but sounds further away this time.

“ _Dean?_ ”

“Huh? What?”

“I asked you how you were feeling.” Sam sounds even more insistent this time. 

“Uh, yeah... not great, I guess. Can’t get m’breath... and I’m tired.”

“Don’t go to sleep, Dean!”

He snorts lazily. “Give me _some_ credit, won’t you? You think I’m just gonna lie down and have a nap when Barney’s three possessed cousins are running round wanting to kill us?”

“Ordinarily no, but-”

“But what?”

“You’re _slurring_ , Dean. You don’t even realise, do you?”

_No_ , is the answer and the realisation jolts him awake. He forces himself to sit up straighter and he grips the phone tightly.

“Be honest, man, do you need to get to the hospital right now? Because I’ll-”

“ _Sam_ ,” he says firmly, having visions of his one-armed brother facing off against Freddy Fazbear and company. “I’m okay. It’s almost morning; a few more hours won’t – might not, kill me.”

“Listen to me, Dean,” Sam continues. “Get somewhere safe, _now_. There was an old closet in that room, wasn’t there? Get inside, but stay on the line, you hear?”

“Yeah, I’ll go in a –”

“Dean, _now!_ ”

He finds himself wondering when Sam became such a _nag_ , even though he pushes himself to his feet and does as he’s told. The closet is located on the wall near the door to the employee locker room, but first he has to clear some of the old furniture in front of it. It’s slow work. Health-wise he’s feeling worse by the minute and he doesn’t want to risk making a noise and attracting any attention. He’s still connected with Sam, his cell phone set on a table behind him and he can practically _feel_ his brother’s worry as he waits silently for Dean to come back on the line.

Once his path is sufficiently cleared, he opens the closet door, grimacing because everything's too loud. It’s fortunately empty and big enough for him to sit in, so he grabs his phone and climbs inside, pulling the doors shut behind him.

“Okay, I’m here, ready for the least awesome game of Hide and Go Seek. So what’s the plan?”

“The plan is we do nothing.”

“Nothing, huh? How long’d it take you to come up with that?” 

He hears Sam’s noise of indignation at the other end of the line and smiles to himself as he tries to get comfortable. 

“Look,” Sam says, ignoring the jibe. “You said it yourself, it’s nearly morning. There are just over two hours left before the lights come back on. You’re in no fit state and neither am I, so the priority now is on just making it through tonight.” Sam hesitates for a moment. “I’m not prepared to lose you again, Dean. Not now, not to this. Not after everything we’ve been through.”

There’s a waver in his brother’s voice that prevents him from saying something flippant in response. 

“I knew there was something wrong,” Sam continues angrily, “I just _knew_ , but I couldn’t put my finger on what it was. I thought... I thought it could be something to do with the Mark though. I never thought for a minute you might be sick.”

“Yeah,” Dean replies, almost to himself. “Never thought being a demon would have its perks.”

Sam doesn’t say anything, and the resulting silence tells Dean that there’s a question in there. The odds are it’ll be a question he’s not interested in answering, because it’s _Sam_ , and Sam always wants to poke around in the darkened recesses of his soul, but he _really_ needs to try and stay awake. He sighs.

“Go on, out with it, Sammy.”

“What... what was it like, being a demon?”

Ha, yeah - he was right about the question then. His instinct is to say something stupid – or maybe even just tell Sam to fuck off, but he always knew they’d be having this conversation at some point, so why _not_ while he’s trapped in a closet with death stalking him from several different angles?

“I wanna say I hated it, but I can’t,” he replies, letting his head rest against the back of the closet and closing his eyes. “It was freeing - like waking up in the morning and just feeling _lighter_ ; all the crap and the guilt was just gone. I didn’t care about anyone or anything and I didn’t care that _I didn’t care_.”

“Like being soulless,” Sam muses.

“Yeah, I guess so. I mean, I was seriously out of it – hell, even Crowley didn’t seem that much of a douchebag.”

Sam snorts in obvious amusement. “I _did_ wonder.”

It’d be easy to take his brother down _this_ path – an entertaining anecdote here, a raucous story there, like the exploits of Crowley and Squirrel were all a bit of harmless fun – a vacation from real life. But that untroubled freedom came with a price that he can’t ignore forever.

“And... and I know I said a lotta stuff before you cured me. Stuff you gotta understand that I regret saying now, Sam, I _do_.”

“Hey,” Sam interjects, his voice firm on the line. “You don’t have to apologize, Dean. I know it wasn’t you, not really.”

“But that’s it, Sam, it _was!_ It’s like the worst part of me got magnified, so I meant every word of what I said at the time. Back at the bunker... I _wanted_ to hurt you. If Cas hadn’t arrived when he did...” He shakes his head even though Sam can’t see it. “You gotta know that kills me, man.”

“Dean, I told you, it’s okay. Shit, I mean, I let you get turned into a _vamp_ when I was soulless. I’d say we’re even, wouldn’t you?”

He’s about to say something back when there’s a noise from somewhere too close by. He shushes Sam, even though his brother hasn’t actually said anything, and strains to listen as the thump of footfalls grow louder. He doesn’t dare move in case the slightest sound advertises his presence, so all he can do is sit, breath held, while he waits and hopes that he won’t be discovered.

It’s ironic to be worrying about being murdered by an oversized animatronic when he’s got a mark on his arm that will probably bring him back anyway, but the curse’s powers of resurrection are no comfort. If anything, they fuel his fears, because Sam’s not the only one who doesn’t want to go through that again.

The thumps grow fainter again and he allows himself the luxury of breathing.

“They’re gone,” he whispers eventually, not wanting to tempt providence but knowing Sam will be about to bust out of his own place of safety if he doesn’t say something soon.

“This is fucking crazy,” Sam replies, sounding harassed. “I’ve lost track of how many times I’ve had to slam the doors.”

“You okay though?”

“Yeah, I think the generator will hold out ‘til six. How you doin’?”

“As well as can be expected for a guy who’s trapped in a closet with probable septic shock.”

“Shit, Dean, we need to get you to a hospital.”

“Hey, you’re not gonna get any argument from me. Just once the crazy’s over with, okay?”

Sam hears what he says about needing the hospital and correctly puts two and two together _because of course he does._

“Do you... do you think the Mark would bring you back again if you, you know?”

And there’s the million dollar question. “I dunno,” he answers honestly. “Truth is, Sammy, I _really_ don’t wanna find out. I know that’s not the impression I gave when you were trying to cure me, but when I think of Mom and Dad, and Bobby even... I can’t be a demon again, Sam, I _can’t_. I know I’ve made some serious mistakes over the years, but becoming _that_ again goes against everything they ever stood for. I can’t let ‘em down again, Sammy. I can’t let _you_ down again...”

“Dean, I did things too. Lester wasn’t the only one-”

“But you _did_ that looking for me, so that’s on me too.”

Sam makes a sound of frustration. “Jesus, Dean. You left a note telling me not to look for you and I did the exact opposite of what you wanted! How is that on you?”

There’s a moment’s silence before Sam’s voice comes back on the line, quieter this time but no less determined.

“Whatever happened, it’s on _us_ , Dean. We’ve always been in it together, so nothing’s different this time, okay? And we’re gonna get out of here, and then get back to looking for a cure for the Mark, together. You hear me?”

“I hear you, little brother,” he replies tiredly.

“Good. The sooner you stop treating me like a ditchable prom date, the better.”

Dean laughs. “You’re the expert on them, Sammy. Uh, Cindy Conway anyone?”

“I _didn’t_ ditch her-”

“She wanted to sleep with you and you didn’t put out – it’s practically the same thing.”

“D’you know how much I regret telling you that,” Sam says, but he sounds amused too. “Remind me never to make bets with you anymore.”

Dean laughs again, thinking back to the time when injury had forced them to take some downtime at the bunker, resulting in a succession of pranks and wagers and way too much time playing videogames and watching TV. Simpler times, before his fateful decision to take on the Mark of Cain. 

“You know. I could just go for a little Guitar Hero right now.”

“Yeah,” Sam asks. “What song would you start with?”

OoOoO

He’s got to hand it to Sam who ensures the conversation flows until there’s a solid _thunk_ of the main power supply starting up again – a blessedly welcome sound that indicates that they’ve made it to six a.m.. At the end of the phone, he hears Sam’s sigh of relief.

“They’ve gone back to the room. We can get out of here. Stay there – I’m coming to get you.”

“Roger that.”

Although sleep is still number one on his wishlist, he pushes open the closet doors and gingerly climbs out, feeling like an old man as he tries to stretch out the kinks in his back. He then turns his attention to the wound on his chest, which he realizes has gone from hot and painful, to hot, painful and oozing.

“Great,” he mutters, just as there’s a bang on the door that leads to the employee locker room. 

“Dean?”

“I’m here,” he replies, throwing back the bolt. 

Sam’s through in an instant, his eyes assessing even though Dean’s been nothing but honest about the state of his health. 

“Can I see?” Sam says, head nodding towards where Dean’s hand rests on his chest.

“Be my guest.” 

Sam steps in to help since lifting his shirts again feels like a ridiculous amount of effort. He hears Sam’s sharp intake of breath when he finds the wound.

“Nice, huh?”

“Come on,” Sam replies. “We need to get you to the hospital _now_.”

He resists as Sam pulls on his jacket. “Don’t you, uh, wanna burn them first?”

Sam makes a face like he’s just suggested that they take all their clothes off and dance around naked in the rain. 

“We’re not burning them, Dean,” Sam says between gritted teeth, in his best barely-keeping-a-lid-on-his-temper voice. 

“You’re no fun anymore, Sammy,” he replies, although he doesn’t resist for a second time when Sam starts to push him towards the exit.

OoOoO

Turns out Sam’s refusal to torch the other animatronics before they leave probably saves his life. He doesn’t remember arriving at the hospital, nor the frantic actions of the medical team as they work to keep him alive. He doesn’t know the story Sam’s spun to the administration - about how he fell while doing construction work and his chest was pierced by a piece of rebar. He doesn’t know that he’s sedated and put on mechanical ventilation while broad spectrum antibiotics and fluid are pumped aggressively through his body. He doesn’t know that Sam’s been informed that the next forty-eight hours are crucial. 

For his part, Sam can only pace the floor and make desultory attempts at things like eating and sleeping while he waits for something to happen. He’s only allowed in to see Dean for two twenty minute visits a day, so he’s relegated to watching the machines that are keeping Dean alive through a window. 

A couple of the nurses take pity on him as he holds his vigil, as it’s obvious that he’s terrified of losing his brother. What they _don’t_ know is he’s equally terrified of what could happen _after_ , if Dean dies. Even when he manages to snatch some sleep, he finds himself in a dream where Dean flatlines and then opens his eyes, as hard and black as onyx, as the medical team unhook him from the now-redundant machines. He wakes to find his mouth is dry and his heart is thudding in his chest.

Three days later, Dean turns a corner. The antibiotics are working and Dean’s organs are out of danger so his brother’s doctors talk of bringing him out of the sedation and taking him off the ventilator. Sam watches while they work, the amount of equipment now halved. Then he returns to waiting. 

Another sixteen hours pass before Dean regains consciousness. If anything, the wait is even more agonising as he’s asked to stay outside while the doctors perform a series of tests. It’s worth it though, when Dean’s physician steps outside and greets Sam with a smile.

“How’s he doing?”

“Well, Mr. Hurley, I’m pleased to report that your brother’s doing exceptionally well - given how serious his condition was when he was first admitted. We’ll continue to monitor him for a little longer, but it’s safe to say that he’s out of danger. He should be well enough to leave in a few days.”

Sam smiles and allows himself a moment to acknowledge the relief at knowing Dean has cheated Death once again.

“Can I see him now?”

“Go on in.”

Dean gives him a lazy smile as he enters the room. He’s regained a little colour and Sam knows instantly that he’s going to be okay.

“How you feeling?” he asks, as he grabs a chair and manoeuvres it to Dean’s bedside.

“Like I’ve had a _really_ good sleep.”

Sam nods and smiles, glad at least that one of them can say that.

“Did you finish the job?” Dean asks, his voice lowered even though there’s no one else around.

“No.” He raises his one good hand quickly before Dean can protest. “I called Rudy. He went in and destroyed the other suits with a couple of other hunters. They went back the day after; no EMF anywhere. It’s done. They also left Strauss’s diary somewhere a little more obvious. Hopefully it should give the families of those missing kids a little closure, even though it won’t bring them back.”

Dean nods, but it’s clear he’s unhappy – not with the outcome, obviously, but the fact that they’ve had to outsource in order to get the job done. Sam’s about to point out that he really had no other option when Dean speaks first.

“So much for making it to five nights.... but you were right, you know; about us not being ready, and I don’t just mean because we were both injured. I’m sorry I didn’t listen to you.”

Sam smiles again. “You don’t need to apologize, Dean. Not to me.”

“Yeah, well.” Dean waves a hand dismissively, but whether it’s for the apology or the advancing chick flick moment isn’t clear. “I figured I should just let you enjoy being right, since it doesn’t happen that often.”

“Screw you,” Sam replies, grinning.

Dean plucks at the pale blue hospital gown and Sam knows that his brother will be leaving here soon, with or without the hospital’s blessing - basically, business as usual.

“So what do we do next?” Sam asks, even though he’s not sure he wants to know the answer. Despite everything his brother’s just said, Dean will probably want to go looking for werewolves or ghouls before they’ve even made it out of the hospital parking lot. To his surprise, Dean glances down at the scar on his arm.

“I think we should head back to the bunker; hit the books again. There’s got to be _something_ on getting rid of this.”

“No jobs?”

“No jobs. You were right – we both went through enough after Metatron killed me, and if we hunt, then we’re just risking the same thing happening again.” Dean studies him carefully. “You good with a little bunker time?”

“More than good,” Sam says, nodding, hopeful that they’re _finally_ on the same page. 

It’s not going to be easy – if it was they’d have found a cure long ago – but working together at least gives them a good shot at it. They’ve both made mistakes in their lives, but he knows that they’ve also achieved some amazing things when they’ve pulled together. If Dean can see that too, then he reckons there’s nothing they can’t do, Mark of Cain included. Being a united force gives him a renewed sense of purpose and he has to fight down the urge to go and ask for Dean’s discharge papers himself. He needs Dean to recover, but he also needs his brother out of here so that they can put this town and this near-disastrous job in the rear view mirror and head home.

They’ve got work to do, after all.

**End**


End file.
